Our View: Children at the border need compassion

The longer the federal government fails to bring meaningful reform to immigration policy, the more humanitarian and social disasters we can expect.

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southcoasttoday.com

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Posted Jun. 15, 2014 at 12:01 AM

Posted Jun. 15, 2014 at 12:01 AM

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The longer the federal government fails to bring meaningful reform to immigration policy, the more humanitarian and social disasters we can expect.

Tens of thousands of children, mostly from poor Central American countries, have been teeming over the Mexican border, some say because they're fleeing crime and corruption, some say because President Barack Obama's single-handed attempts at reform were shortsighted or have backfired.

It does matter and it will matter what the reasons are, but today there are thousands of parentless children just crossed the border in need. What they need is to be reunited with their families, wherever they are, here or back where they fled.

Does that mean they should be sent back to their home countries? That's what the law says, and that's what U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Jen Johnson said on Thursday.

"Those who cross our borders today illegally, including children, are not eligible for an earned path to citizenship," he said."Those apprehended at our border are priorities for removal ... regardless of age."

And that is as it should be.

Johnson also says the goal of the government is to act "in the best interest of the child," and that means that there are and should be some cases where children should remain in the states, at least for now, because their parents are here, and every situation is unique. We are a nation of law, but we can't deny the need for the law's flexibility and accommodation when human needs are the issue.

Our agents, whether delivering enforcement, health or social services, must work fairly, compassionately and quickly to apply judgment for the health and safety of these many thousands of children.

But members of Congress critical of the president's attempt to legislate without them have little ground to stand on. Attempts to have intelligent debate in the Senate and House have been made, only to be thwarted by unreasonable, inflexible ideologues who are so afraid of immigration, they appear to be paralyzed by the mere thought of debate.

This influence promises to deliver the White House to Democrats again in 2016, and the louder the intransigent in Congress squawk and the longer they stall, the more likely every new immigration crisis reminds voters how tonedeaf the intransigent are.

Eventually, congressional stonewallers are going to have to come around and work with their colleagues, or they'll be voted out of the chance, because with or without immigration reform, awareness is growing of who is behind the lack of progress on the issue and where the roots of these crises lie.

In the meantime, there are thousands of children in need. In the U.S. legally or not, we need to move quickly and decisively to protect the vulnerable.